


Kiss the Sun

by Corehealer



Series: EmetWoL Event - Valentione's Week 2021 [5]
Category: Ascian - Fandom, Final Fantasy XIV, Shadowbringers - Fandom
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, F/F, F/M, Falling In Love, First Kiss, Kissing, Love Triangle, Memory, Memory Magic, Multi, New Lovers, Other, Poems, Polyamory, Polyamory Negotiations, Self-Reflection, Singing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-12 23:40:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29517531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Corehealer/pseuds/Corehealer
Summary: Entry Seven in the EmetWoL Valentione's Week event. For this Valentione's Day prompt, First Kiss, a bit of a surreal moment, a bit of angst, and then something special.Sarah has been wandering in the Cocytus Library within Hades' recreated Amaurot, the place she once worked in and ran prior to becoming Azem. After a while, she comes upon the bench in the nearby park where she first kissed Hades all those years ago. She reads a plaque bearing a poem of his that he left there for her to find, and saddened and exhausted by its contents, falls asleep on the bench lost in thought.She awakens to find he is nearby, and that her other partner, Luciane, has fallen asleep next to her, after both of them had gone looking for her. She and he discuss their situation in the modern world, reminisce on the kiss, and muse on the nature of their relationships with Luciane and one another in the present moment.
Relationships: Azem/Emet-Selch (Final Fantasy XIV), Emet-Selch (Final Fantasy XIV)/Original Female Character(s), Emet-Selch/Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Luciane Corne/Emet-Selch, Luciane Corne/Original Final Fantasy XIV Characters, Luciane Corne/Warrior of Light
Series: EmetWoL Event - Valentione's Week 2021 [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2155329
Kudos: 2





	Kiss the Sun

_‘I searched everywhere,_

_Just to hear your call._

_But I could not find it.’_

_‘I walked upon strange roads, as you did,_

_In worlds I used to know before._

_Saw no sign of you.’_

_‘Sang out my song,_

_Of ancient days. Year after year._

_And listened for your response upon the wind, hearing silence.’_

_‘Where is my heart?_

_The light gone from my chest._

_I've lost everything.’_

_‘I gave to you my soul, long before His touch,_

_In this place._

_Sitting here in your company, sharing the warmth of your lips.’_

_‘The meaning of all that I believed before, escapes me,_

_For it was a world bereft._

_In a world without you, the world is without meaning.’_

_‘I pray you will find these words one day._

_And remember me._

_And that first embrace, so long ago.’_

Evening in Amaurot. The sun was gone, but the last of its light tinged the sky a dusky twilight, purple and blue tones painted softly over the city’s surface. Reflecting in the shining towers and their many lights. Curling up into the crystals that were embedded into their corners, and onto their windows.

Crickets chirped their song in the gardens of the park next to the Cocytus Library. Lamp lights along the walkways were beginning to crackle with life, and bring small golden beams down upon the surface of this serene place, bereft at present of any souls.

Time and place seemed to have bent for a moment for her, that weary wandering woman, as she stood silently in front of a solitary bench, set off to one side facing the canal and the lazy river lapping along within. She had read a plaque attached across the front of the seat’s upper back, and the poem he had placed there for her.

He must have placed this here before he knew of the outcome. Or perhaps the city was an even older abode than a recreation for our sake. Whatever the reason for it, to read it now...

She ran her hands over it. No tears came this time, her weariness from the day’s events preventing her from mustering more than a sad face, and a desire to now sit upon the bench next to the plaque and read it over again, which she now did.

For all the reality of this recreation of their ancient home, she sometimes forgot that it wasn’t real in the full sense. Despite being solid and filled with colour and sound and light, it was as Hythlodaeus had said to her that first day she had arrived here, at the bitter end of a long road. A finely crafted stage. A bubble. Honed by his mind and biases and desires towards singular purposes.

No true Amaurot. And yet.

It spoke to her perhaps more than even the real one could have, given everything that had happened. Because of what he had done to change it, and shape it. To make it more their city, hers and his, than a fully realized rendition of the one that had once existed, and been shaped and known by many souls.

No one could live here forever. Not like that place. Much as she might like to try.

She leaned into the bench. It was a firm metal and stone structure, mildly ornate but not overly so. Artistically decorated in the same manner as all else in the city, with minimalist tendencies but subtle, evocative curves and flat surfaces. Tinged a bit brown and gold, with blue crystal trims. Nothing particularly fancy or eye-catching.

But for her, it may as well have been the center of the universe. A gravity well which she had been unknowingly drawn towards all her life. The place where they had shared their first kiss. A memory that was the very first from her old life that she had recalled. One that had endured all that had followed.

She sighed, and turned from the plaque, now gazing silently up at the burgeoning starry sky he had created for her the day prior. Returning now from the simulation of day he had begun to regulate to bring yet more life to this husk.

She’d wandered away from him and the others again, to find a moment to herself. Had come to the Library because of how important it, too, was to her prior life. How much more like home it felt even compared to the rest of the city, and her actual home in the apartment block. And in wandering here, now found herself in this place.

She’d expected she would eventually come upon it, perhaps in his company. Now it felt a little like fate was toying with her, to place her now in this spot, alone. So that she could see this little thing he’d placed here, however long ago, to give voice to his despair. A despair she now felt and shared in, and allowed to wiggle around in her stomach.

Despite all the good intentions, all the convictions, all the reasons under the sun, she could not feel anything but regret in this moment. For the way she had treated him. For the way she had left him holding so much, and made him weep for so long. Bereft of her while she presumably slept away all those eras in the Lifestream.

Reformed now only to become a pawn of the very thing that had deprived the world of its true shape. A being that she no longer knew what to think of.

She found herself in the moment of their first kiss, with the sky as it had been, and the garden as it had been, and the bench much the same. The only thing missing was him. And all the years they’d missed for the lack of one another.

She wept a little, finally, into her robe’s arms, before passing out on the bench for a time.

***

When she awoke some bells later, she found herself with a companion, though not the one she had expected to find.

Her other partner of both distant and recent days. Luciane. Fast asleep next to her, with a hand still laying over the plaque. She must have read it.

Rubbing weariness from her eyes but taking care not to disturb her, she looked around. Night had fully descended now, and she could see the silhouette of another figure standing in the lamplight nearby, facing the canal with arms behind his back.

Her Hades. Emet-Selch.

She got up softly, stretched, and taking a moment to ensure Luciane remained asleep, walked over to him.

“Good evening, my love.”

His facial expression was distant and unreadable. He spoke no words, simply looking up at the sky.

She did the same for a while, without much else to say. The moment... these moments in this place and time. They felt surreal to her, as they seemed to feel for him. Perhaps moreso for his longer awareness and context.

After a few minutes of standing and staring upward in this manner, he spoke.

“ _I take it you read the words, then_.”

“As did she, I think. I was asleep before she arrived. I was wandering the Library for a time, and then came upon this park, and the bench.”

He nodded, and finally turned to her, smiling softly.

“ _We’ve spoken many times of that long period between when the world was as it used to be, and what it is now. Tiny lines on a piece of metal ill do it justice, but I hope the words sufficed to communicate a bit of it_.”

“Yes.”

She gazed down at the water in the canal, bobbing slightly up and down, with light from the nearby spires across the way and the stars above mingling with the movement of its waves.

“I cannot help but feel at a loss for words. Nothing I say feels equal to it. Thousands of years.”

She sighed.

“I do not regret my convictions. They have begun to bear out, finally, despite everything. But I do still regret that you had to go so long without me, when I did not have to do likewise.”

“ _I take some measure of relief from the knowledge that you seem, at least to yourself, to have not been reborn prior to this life. And just like with your Amanuensis sleeping there on the bench, you were spared the suffering that elicited such words_.”

“I did not want to be spared. I had no say in this. I merely wanted to do what I thought was right. To spare us all the loss of our will. Our world.”

She balled up her hands into fists, shaking slightly.

“And I let us all down. I let you down. I... I was a fool to think I could have done better.”

“ _Not any more a fool than we were, for our desperate solution, and what it created. Zodiark remains even now to my mind a preferable solution than the alternative, or to Hydaelyn, but His existence, His very nature, like that of all primals... it would have robbed us of our way in the end all the same_.”

He shook his head.

“ _Not that we will ever know what the alternative would have borne out, now. Had She never been, and you never left_.”

They stood in silence for another few moments, thinking upon that possible world, and the sound of chirping crickets.

“I don’t recall crickets in Amaurot.”

He waved his hand a bit, as if dismissing the comment.

“ _A little something to fill the silence. This city can be deathly quiet. And for lack of the ability to recreate everything about the sound of it during the night, and the sounds of our people, I opted to bring a little nature back to this green space_.”

She nodded. It did feel appropriate, the more she listened to it. An enjoyable, soothing sound in its own right.

“So... why is she here, anyway? Do you know?”

“ _She and I came upon you together, whilst walking around the grounds. I had assumed you were inside taking in the sights of your oldest home, and had thought to take her to see it. She opted to rest next to you after a while. After we discussed the significance of this bench_.”

He shrugged.

“ _She has in some ways more to remember than you at this point, and Cocytus is a place dear to you both, though for her moreso as a reference to her youth and her first thoughts of you_.”

“I was in there for a time, looking through the halls. It felt too quiet though, even for a library. Lacking the same warmth I recalled enjoying. That energy of souls learning and sharing.”

He nodded.

“ _An energy I came to appreciate in turn during my years visiting you there, prior to Azem. And then the bench..._ ”

“Our first kiss. Unforgettable.”

“ _Indeed_.”

He took her hands in his, and faced her, as she came to face him.

“ _She and I talked for a long while, about a number of things. Including our thoughts about one another. And though it may be hard for you to believe, I have seldom loved another as I loved you, so this has been... a bit of a novel experience for me_.”

“So... things seem to be changing on that front too?”

“ _As if to match this modern world, and the changing nature of reality as it exists now relative to our own time. That I should change too, and do a bit more as you do. Perhaps more than even I expected_.”

“She has that effect on people.”

They chuckled a bit at one another.

“ _We have decided to focus on you together, and see what happens between us. A spark_.”

“I am happy for you both, and I am happier still for you both being in my life. If ever there was another who I could call my dearest friend, it would be her. My Ariadne. Luciane.”

“ _Perhaps it is because I see a great deal of her in you, that she has spurred such emotion in me. But I sense it is also because she is, in many ways, different as well. Enticingly so. I can see moreso now the appeal of your path, and the bonds you make_.”

“Spoken like a man who has a half a dozen imperial lineages under his belt.”

“ _All done in service to duty. Now I can follow my heart. Another gift from you_.”

“Hopefully one that can finally help ease the pain.”

“ _Oh, I don’t believe anything will ever fully accomplish that. But I am glad to try, in very fine company_.”

“I can think of one thing that might help...”

She leaned in and kissed him softly on the lips, facing up towards him as he leaned down slightly to her level.

“ _By your Twelve... you might be right..._ ”

The taste of days long gone. Now returned. It felt for a moment as though they were back on that bench, not far from them, doing as they had that very first night. When they had finally confessed their feelings to one another, and began a new life together. Her life as Azem, in tandem with her life in his arms.

Their aether and souls mingling and pooling in each other’s breasts, binding them and their fates together, for weal or for woe. Through all that came after.

And despite all that had happened to change them, and which still acted upon them, they had found one another again. And were finally able to try and find a new way forwards. Not just for themselves, but for those they cherished, and for all people. For everyone.

***

Yet more time passed in silence as they listened to the crickets and the wind, another creation of his will. Gazing up into the stars above. Arms around one another, facing upwards.

The sound of stretching and groaning now, as they turned over towards the bench to see Luciane there, adjusting her posture as she rose from her sleeping spot.

“That cannot have been very comfortable to sleep on.”

“At least... ugh... not in the manner I did. Ah. Remind me not to make a habit of that.”

She scoffed, and left Hades’ side to walk over to her and embrace her.

“How are you feeling Luciane? Aside from the rough sleep?”

“Well enough. How fare the both of you?”

He walked over to where they now stood together before the bench.

“ _Better now than we have been in millenia_.”

“Oh, is that all?”

She leaned over to him and kissed him on the cheek as Sarah looked on, smiling.

“Glad to hear it Hades.”

He chuckled to himself and shook his head, still surprised over this increasingly new development. To find himself in the company of a new lover, after so long awaiting the return of what he had believed to be his sole one. His one true love.

She’d apparently started rubbing off on him again, in the manner she once had. In the way she took many to her heart and held them close. Cherished them. But none moreso than him. And her.

Sarah sat down on the bench, still a bit exhausted given the late hour despite her nap. As if giving voice to him in much the same manner as he often did for her, she spoke, mimicking his cadence.

“What a world this is, heroes.”

“ _You stole my line, my dear_.”

They laughed together, and the two of them sat on opposite sides of her, kissing her cheeks simultaneously from either side of her. She grinned from ear to ear.

“Thank you both for being in my life.”

She turned to Hades.

“And thank you especially, for never forgetting. No matter how much it hurt.”

She reached in, grabbed the back of his head, and drew him in for a long kiss, savouring every note that streamed out of his muffled mouth. Luciane looked on and smiled softly, grateful for the chance to not only witness such a depth of devotion in her lifetime, but now also to share in it. Increasingly so, for her earlier exchange with him.

A far cry from the life of a Guildmaster in Gridania, to now find herself here, between time and space and memory, between identities old and new, in the company of her dearest friends. And the light she had always longed to hold close. It was enough to bring anyone to tears, but for now, she felt more inclined to sing.

She leaned back into the bench as they continued to kiss and sang a few notes of a song she’d begun to have form in her mind. Gazing up at the sky as she hummed off each word.

**“I searched everywhere,**

**Just to hear your call.**

**And now I have found it.”**

**“I walked upon strange roads, as you did,**

**In worlds I used to know before.**

**And now see you in everything, everywhere.”**

**“Sang out my song,**

**Of ancient days. Year after year.**

**And listened for your response upon the wind, hearing you call after me.”**

**“Where is my heart?**

**The light that abides ever in my chest?**

**They are here, dear sun. They rise with you in the morning.”**

**“I give to you my soul,**

**In this place.**

**Sitting here in your company, sharing the warmth of your lips.”**

**“The meaning of all this, this world,**

**Is quite beyond me, even now.**

**But at least it is a world no longer bereft of you.”**

**“I pray you will remember these words one day.**

**And remember me.**

**And that first embrace, so long ago.”**

She closed her eyes, listening to the crickets chirping. Lost in dreams, and memories of home. When at last they relented their embrace, they chatting happily for a while, and shared their dreams together, under a starry sky.

**Author's Note:**

> As is the case with my formal series shipping Emet-Selch with my Warrior of Light (which this is a seasonal event extension of), I italicize Emet's speech here out of respect and admiration for him and to add definition to his words when he speaks in a scene. Just for clarification.
> 
> Sarah has several ships, as has been previously noted, but of them, the two principal NPC ships she has are Emet-Selch/Hades, and Archer Guildmaster Luciane Corne. The latter is a complex circumstance that I touch on in my main work regarding her, The Guildmaster's Quiver, but suffice to say she is very much a rareship you likely won't see anywhere else, given her minor nature as a 1-30 ARC quest NPC. Even so, I always found her to be captivating, so much so that she now finds herself placed on equal footing to my WoL and her Ascian husband.
> 
> With this work, I sought to begin poking more at the growing relationship between her and Emet-Selch, while maintaining the event focus on EmetWoL. Of special significance for me is the way in which she is providing with her burgeoning relationship with him a means by which he can reflect on all the ways Sarah has changed him, and helped him to adjust to the modern world. To accept that he is not as he once was, just as the world is not as it once was.
> 
> I also just find the prospect of their little love triangle endlessly enjoyable, as a poly person myself. In my fics, polyamorous representation will always be present.


End file.
